In a certain electro-mechanical device, it is desirable to supply two parallel independent electrical connectors each having a desired number of receptacle contacts disposed in a single row along the length of a housing at a constant pitch. Such independent connectors are electrically connected to a matable electrical connector having two rows of pin contacts disposed along the length of the housing at the corresponding pitch.
Conventionally, a box-type holder is formed by opening only at the one side plane along the rear surface from which electrical wires extend. Connectors having receptacle-type contacts are mated in parallel from the open side plane of the holder. Under this mated condition, the connectors are electrically connected by mating with a matable connector having male contacts.
It may be possible to make a single connector by integrating two connectors having female contacts in order to meet the above needs, thereby eliminating the need for the holder. However, in such a connector for making insulation-displacement connections between contacts and electrical wires, such insulation displacement connection is made either separately for each row of contacts or simultaneously for the two rows of contacts. The former process is not suited for high speed production because insulation displacement connection is repeated in two steps for first and second rows of contacts and the connector must be turned over. The latter process is not applicable to currently available automatic production machines because of its technical difficulty.
The above holder is bulky due to both sidewalls along its length. Therefore, such holder is not suitable to meet the overall compact connector design.
In addition, a connector having a relatively large number of contacts requires a relatively larger holder to mate with such connector. The larger the connector and the holder, the higher is the insertion and extraction forces therebetween, thereby requiring that they be constructed with increased holding strength. This further increases insertion and extraction resistance of the connector into and out of the holder, thus resulting in poor operability.
Another problem associated with a larger holder is increased warping of the sidewalls along its length, which results in poor operability of the connector with respect to the holder.
Therefore, there is a strong need to overcome the disadvantages of the prior art technology.
It is an object of this invention to provide an electrical connector holder to solve the above problems by forming connector-holding chambers divided by a center isolation wall to replace opposing sidewalls of the above holder and engaging means at desired locations, thereby holding an electrical connector in each chamber.